Blog - The Man in Black

Friday, July 21, 2006

T.G.I.F.

The last few days have been pretty good, no complaints whatsoever. I'll be working with a terrific author, I edited the first few chapters of an author's manuscript yesterday (which were quite good), and I started reading Michael Connelly's THE LINCOLN LAWYER which I'm enjoying. I've been a Harry Bosch fan for years, and LINCOLN is a decidedly different kind of book for Connelly (mainly in that the main character is a complete scumbag, but the kind of scumbag who has a heart underneath the grime). Plus I'm doing the book "Double Fist." My morning commute entails walking a little over 5 avenues to the N/R/W train, during which I listen to my iPod (which is on its last legs, but that's another issue). Then when I'm actually on the train, I read a paperback. So yesterday I downloaded Scott Smith's THE RUINS from iTunes to listen to on my walk to the subway, while saving LINCOLN LAWYER for the actual train. I liked Smith's A SIMPLE PLAN, though it was one of the few books where I liked the movie better. Not that it wasn't a good book, but the movie was fantastic. Sam Raimi directing with no budget (which is when he's at his best), Billy Bob Thornton in an Oscar-nominated performance (he should have won), and the always good Bill Paxton and Bridget Fonda rounding out a great cast. One of the most underrated movies of the last decade.On Sunday, I'm going to hear one of my authors speak. Her book just came out and seems to be getting good publicity and selling well, so I'm happy and she seems to be too. When a book I edited is about to pub, other than the author and his/her parents, I probably monitor Amazon closer than anybody. I refresh that thing countless times a day. Plus another one of my books is amazingly high on Amazon a full 2 months before it even comes out, which bodes extremely well. Of course Amazon only represents about 5% of total sales, but I'm still obsessed. In 2007 there are 12 books I've bought/edited scheduled to be published. Which means I anticipate roughly 120,189,384 refreshes on Amazon in that calendar year.Oh wait. My book is coming out in 2007 too. Make it 251,273,914 Amazon refreshes.

I have THE LINCOLN LAWYER in my TBR pile. I've had it since it came out. It came with my to RT, but I didn't have time to read it; it came with me to ITW and I didn't have time to read it. Now I have no time because I have another book due in 4 weeks.

BTW, I thought Amazon represented something like less than 1% of sales. But you're the editor, you'd know. I haven't seen a royalty statement yet. I hear RH has the best in the industry, but I don't know what kind of details will be on it, like where sales come from, etc. I should be seeing one pretty soon, though . . .

Hey, maybe you can do a blog on royalty statements! (not that I'm trying to make work for you or anything . . . )

Not a bad idea, Allison, I just might do that (assuming a post about royalty statements doesn't bore people to death).

Amazon counts for about 5% of the overall bookselling market, but that number varies depending on format. The number is closer to 10% on hardcovers, since they offer 30-40% discounts on nearly every title, whereas bookstores generally offer those discounts only for the new, major releases.

It is closer to 1% for mass market books, since there's very seldom any discount at all, and it makes more sense for people to buy those books directly from stores and not pay extra shipping charges.